1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method and system for indicating authentication of the identity of a calling party based on an intrinsic property of the calling party. More particularly, it relates to providing calling party identification in addition to, or instead of, calling line identification, and routing calls based on such information and/or accessing caller information for display or other purposes.
2. Description of Related Art
The use of calling line identification information to identify a calling party has found wide use in public switched telephony. However, calling line identification only provides a called party with the identity of the telephone line on which the call is initiated and the name of the registered subscriber of such line. As a household or business will often have only a single telephone line, or fewer telephone lines than people, multiple users of the same telephone line are not uniquely identified to the parties they call. Hence, calling line identification information is incomplete and unreliable with respect to identification of a specific calling party.
Identifying a specific calling party is commonly done after a telephone call is established. The called party or automated equipment on the called party's line, as in the case of a bank, may request the calling party to identify himself through the use of a personal identification number or functionally equivalent construct. The called party may then respond appropriately based on the identity indicated by the calling party. This however, requires that the calling party remember a unique identification number. Experience has shown that such numbers are easily forgotten or may be shared with other parties, such as spouses, for example. Consequently, the use of passwords to uniquely identify a calling party is not completely reliable and is vulnerable to misuse.
What would be desirable therefore is an efficient, conclusive and economical way of providing a called party with calling party information, such as calling party identity, unique to the person actually making the call and based upon nontransferable characteristics of the calling party.